A Table in the Presence of My Enemies
by The Dark-Eyed One
Summary: In a parallel universe, Samuel Sullivan told Claire Bennett that freedom was just another word for nothing left to lose. This is the story of how a Claire from a much darker universe became completely free.
1. Chapter 1

The snow enthralled Peter. He stood at the French windows of his mother's home, transfixed by the site of millions of tiny flecks of frozen water, falling from the great grey nothingness of sky. He was intrigued by the simultaneous weakness and strength of the snow. One flake was nothing; a mere wisp of air and water that broke under the heat of his palm. Yet many, many of them, working all together, could immobilize an entire town, could crush and bury the very same body that held a single snowflake in its palm.

Peter loved the way the snow was a large blanket, too. Covering all in sight, making it difficult to distinguish one house from another, one person from another. He remembered the words from the poem his mother had read to him the night before.

"It makes an even face of mountain and of plain," Peter murmured softly.

"Come away from the door," his mother ordered from her seat on the sofa across the room. "You've been over there for an hour. It will still be there tomorrow."

"But I've never seen snow in real life," Peter protested, walking over to the sofa and nestling against her. "It's always been warm where we've lived."

His mother looked down at him with her steel blue eyes. "I've always tried to keep you from the cold," she replied sternly, but consented to wrap an arm around Peter when he butted up against her unyieldingly.

For a while Peter was silent, so silent in fact, that his mother believed he was asleep and the only sound that filled the drawing room of the Swiss mansion was his breathing and the tight flips of the pages of her book. It was a sweet nothingness, a beautiful calm that Peter's mother so rarely had enjoyed in her life. She drank it in like the air, feeling the whiteness of the sky outside the windows and tasting the crisp taps of the flakes against the panes. The weight of the boy lying in her lap was nothing at all.

A question broke the calm. "Why do I have to leave tomorrow?"

Peter's mother looked down at her lap in surprise. Peter's wide, dark eyes met hers in question.

She sighed. "Because you have to."

"But why do I have to?"

Claire now closed the book, tossed it onto the coffee table, and pushed Peter off of her lap, sitting him down next to her.

"Because it'll keep you safe."

Peter leaned against Claire again, not caring that she kept her body stiff against his affections. "I don't want to leave you. I'll never see you again if I do."

Claire rolled her eyes. The boy was smart; it did no good to lie to him. In some ways that made her job easier. In other ways it made her feel like a monster, telling the brutal truth to a six year old boy.

_But then again_, she silently reasoned, _I am a monster_.

"Yes, that's true. You won't," she said softly, gently curling his dark hair between her fingers. "But you'll be with others like you. Other little boys, who like the things you do, who can do the things you can do. You'll be happy there."

"No, I won't."

"You'll make friends."

"I don't want friends."

"Of course you do."

"No, I don't."

"That's just because your world right now revolves around me," Claire explained. "But very soon you'll realize just how big it really is, and how special you are. You'll see that eventually you have to give up the things you love…but it's always for the best." She stood up now, holding out her hand.

Peter hesitated for a moment, but finally took her hand, and it felt hot and hard against his. His mother led him upstairs, to the bathroom where she drew a hot bath for him. She filled the steamy water with blueberry scented soap and allowed him to play with his plastic boats while she scrubbed the back of his neck and behind his ears and under his fingernails. She lifted him from the tub and silently dried him off. She made him put on his pajamas by himself, but she combed his hair. She stood in the doorway of the bathroom while he brushed his teeth, counting the time to make sure he scrubbed every corner of his mouth. But when he was done, she lifted him in her arms, the way she had when he was much younger, and put him to bed, tucking his blue and white quilt around him.

She dimmed the light by his bed. "Go to sleep," she told him. "Don't get up to stare at the snow. It'll be there tomorrow, like I said." She began to walk out of the room.

"Mommy."

Claire turned back at the small sound, slightly muffled by the blankets. "Yes."

"Will you miss me after I'm gone?"

Claire walked back to the bed, staring down at the little boy she'd raised from a seed. The dark eyes staring up from the Little Boy Blue bed were pure, and innocent, and they demanded what every child had the natural right to demand. But what those eyes wanted had drained out of Claire years ago.

"No more questions," she said. "It's time for bed. We'll have breakfast, then Samuel will take you home."

"But this _is_ home," Peter protested. But he turned over, away from Claire, succeeding in having the last word.

Claire now went to her room, retrieving a suitcase for Peter to take with him. She would tell him that it had everything he needed to start his new life, but it was a lie. His life was going to end the moment he left that house.

"I _am_ a monster," Claire admitted out loud, as she packed the clothes and shoes Peter would never wear, packed the photos the two of them had taken that he would never see. She stopped, thought of something as she packed Peter's teddy bear.

She pressed the dark brown mass of fur and cotton - a symbol of the fragility of innocence - against her chest and sighed deeply.

"But then again…so is he."


	2. Chapter 2

_Many years earlier…_

"Ladies and gentlemen, our humble carnival is fortunate to have a brand new, truly wonderous act as part of our repertoire," Samuel announced to the dozen or so visitors that crowded around the small arena they built in the center of the campground. "And it is with absolutely no arrogance that I say that you folks are lucky to be the first to see this act performed, and I assure you it is being performed nowhere else."

Samuel then turned to the curtains behind him and nodded to the small boy standing to the side. The boy pulled back the curtain, and there emerged an exotic looking girl, clad in a long red and gold silk skirt and matching tunic. Her hair was tucked into an orange turban, her eyes smoky with kohl. As she walked to the stage, a light tinkling sound could be made, thanks to the anklets she wore on both feet. She said nothing, but smiled majestically and bowed to the audience, which was comprised mostly of lower middle class white families and truckers with a couple of hours to kill before their shift. Even so, the regal quality of the young woman before them seemed to captivate this otherwise dull band of spectators.

Samuel smiled slyly and now beckoned for his hands to bring out what looked like a body slab. The audience's eyes were instantly diverted from the beautiful lady to the slab, which appeared to be covered with dozens of glowing rocks.

"Now ladies and gentlemen, surely you have heard of the firewalkers of India, who amble across fiery hot coals on their bare feet. Quite a feat, no pun intended. But ladies and gentlemen, we're here to present something truly incredible. For this pretty lady isn't going to walk across these hot coals; she's going to lie down in them!"

Samuel paused for the shocked exclamations from the audience, turned his eyes downward in mock embarrassment from the few incredulous swears from the truckers. The young lady's serene, Buddha-like expression did not change save for a tiny upturn of the corner of her mouth that only her assistant, the little boy, had caught.

"Folks I can assure you, no harm will come to the lady, for she is blessed with a fortitude of mind and spirit that makes her the one and only person in the world who can accomplish this task. And, before we begin, I must stress the previous fact once again: she is the only person who can do this safely. Please do not attempt this yourself."

Samuel now courteously held out his hand. "My dear," he said to the lady in red. She nodded to him with all the grace of a queen of the orient and allowed him to guide her to the slab, where she squatted in front of the coals. She put out her left hand first, onto the coal bed, ignoring the gasps and cries of the audience as her flesh sizzled against the rocks. She turned herself around now, so she faced the audience. Her right foot now made contact with the bed, and she swung her left foot underneath while her right hand came to rest parallel to its partner. Then, with the strength and agility of a gymnast, she lowered herself onto the bed, slowly, almost seductively. Now she lay on her back, eyes watching the golden ball in the sky, breathing in as slowly and as deeply as if the bed were covered in satin instead of 500-degree rocks of fire.

"It's a trick!" someone called from the audience. Samuel turned in the direction of the voice and caught the gaze of a man in his mid to late forties, wearing a Lynyrd Skynyrd t-shirt and grasping an oversized cup so tightly his knuckles were white. Samuel recognized that panic in his voice; he'd heard it hundreds of times before from patrons who were so terrified by what they saw they had to convince themselves as much as anyone else that their eyes were not showing them what they indeed were seeing.

"I can see why you might believe that, sir," Samuel replied. "But as you can see, the young lady is lying on these coals, and these are hot coals. Perhaps you'd like to come up and feel them for yourself."

Instantly the man's face changed expression as Samuel turned the tables on him. He began to protest, to try to worm his way out of it, only to have other men, namely the burly truck drivers, egg him in on a show of bravado.

"Now, now, gentleman, that won't be necessary. I can prove it. Manuel!" Samuel called to the young boy assisting with the act. Obediently the dark child approached the slab, and with a soaked sponge, dropped only two droplets of water onto a coal near the girl's head. It sizzled and became steam in less than a second.

The audience's hushed tones of surprise worked easily at forcing the man to sit down again. Samuel smiled and continued. "Now, ladies and gentlemen, there is more. For this beautiful young lady isn't just going to lie on these coals; she's going to be covered in them!"

With that, two muscular young men carried out a single barrel, and, before the audience could react, dumped them on the prone form of the girl.

Samuel stood silently, allowed the horrified shrieks of the audience to die down. The entire time probably lasted about two minutes, which was just long enough. Taking a wooden rake from little Manuel, Samuel now walked back to center stage, making motions with his free hand to calm the crowd.

"And now, ladies and gentlemen, I will rake back the coals from the young lady, and arouse her from her incendiary slumber." The angry-looking coals glowed in admission.

Five coals, six, seven raked away. Ten now, then twelve. People were rising from their seats to catch a glimpse of the body beneath them, curious to see if she would emerge as burned as they imagined. Twenty, and peach colored flesh could be seen. Thirty, and an arm appeared. Thirty five, and now the body broke free on its own, kicking the coals away.

Not a scar, not a burn. The full skirt and tunic had melted away, as had the turban. Out stepped the gorgeous petite girl, her golden hair now falling in waves around her face, wearing a heavy-looking black bikini.

Taking her hand, Samuel announced to the audience, "Ladies and gentleman, may I present to you, Lady Phoenix. Just like the mythic creature she was named for, Lady Phoenix has risen from the fire refreshed," Samuel now turned her around to show her bare back, "and unscarred!"

The thunder of applause was almost deafening. The audience was enthralled, so much so they nearly stormed the stage to get near the star of the act. In a flash the stage hands covered Lady Phoenix in a blanket and whisked her away, leaving Samuel to deal with both the boon and bane of the highly successful presentation.

* * *

Barbecued pork and chicken. Corn mush and fried potatoes. Roasted apples and pears. Over a dozen people, crowded around one table, and yet there was plenty, more than plenty. And it kept coming.

Claire was surprised at how hungry she was after the act. She had been so anxious prior to her performance, feeling like an overwound mechanical toy. She hadn't been able to sleep or eat in her tense state, but now that she had survived her first performance she felt more like a dishrag that had been wrung dry, and she was exhausted. Nonetheless she tucked into her food with a vigor she hadn't experienced since eating her mother's down home cooking in Odessa.

The thought of her mother slowed down her chewing and she felt a heaviness on her heart. She realized how much she missed her mother. She wondered if Sandra was worried about her. She'd been preoccupied with developing her carnival act and facing her anxiety that she hadn't had the time to feel guilt about abandoning the life she led. Now the things she left behind felt like an avalanche she was hiding behind a rickety wooden door: they were packed away safely, but she knew they would eventually wash over her with a vengeance.

She felt a warm hand on her shoulder and she turned to see who it was. She smiled and briefly forgot her thoughts.

"You did wonderfully today," Samuel told her.

Claire chuckled. "I hope I didn't cause too much of a riot for you to deal with." She remembered the looks of the audience, especially men, when she emerged from the coals wearing only the fire-proof bra and knickers that Olivia, the carnival's seamstress, had designed especially for her.

"Sex sells, Hon," Olivia told her in her muddled-sounding Baltimore accent as Claire was fitted for her costume two days earlier. "The maharaji get-up is made of my own special concoction. It'll melt away when you're covered by the coals. Not that any of those horny pigs sittin' in the audience will notice."

Samuel threw his head back in laughter. "Ha! Well, it was worth it. We've never made so much money in one day than we did today. It was because of you, my Claire." With that, Samuel stood up and made his way to the head of the table.

"May I have your attention, brothers and sisters?" Samuel announced. The scattered conversations came to a halt as all eyes fell upon the carnival leader. "I'd like to make a few announcements while we enjoy our meal together. First, I'd like to congratulate everyone on a job well done. This has been a very successful run, the most successful we've ever enjoyed in the great state of South Carolina, to be exact."

Claire now looked around at the other members of the carnival. They all seemed to be confused, and she knew why. They were scheduled to be at this location for another two days, and Samuel seemed to be implying that they would be leaving soon.

Samuel knew this too. "Now, everyone, I know what you're thinking, and you're right. I've decided that we're going to leave this area earlier than planned. And part of this decision is based, in part, on our newest member's spectacular opening performance today. Everyone give a round of applause to our newest family member, Lady Phoenix!"

Everyone turned their eyes to Claire and showered her with applause. She blushed and smiled, a little surprised by the attention. Her eyes then met the eyes of the only person not applauding. It was the tattooed lady, Lydia, who seemed to have been avoiding Claire since she arrived. The older woman looked away quickly, her mouth deeply set with anger and frustration.

Claire blanched at this, but tried to ignore it and focus on Samuel's words as the charismatic leader continued. "I want to assure you I have given this the greatest of careful thought and consideration…and conferred with our elder family members." Here Samuel nodded to Olivia and Marcus, sitting at his immediate left, who nodded in agreement. "Friends," Samuel began again, leaning forward, "I have decided that the next location for our carnival will be Washington D.C."

Claire looked around, taking in the shocked expressions and whispered fears amongst the other performers. Some of the younger children even needed to be comforted by their parents. She turned to her right, and noticed that little Manuel, her assigned assistant for her act, had huddled closer to her.

Samuel continued his speech. "Now friends, I know that this comes as quite a shock to you. We've never performed in a major city like the nation capital, only the outskirts. This is part of the speech I made to you all two weeks ago regarding our future. I promised that we would be forging the way to a new life for all of us, a life that meant no longer living in hiding or in fear. A life that promises health and wealth and comfort for our children. And I feel that the best way to begin is to gain more exposure to the general public, to be known to those outside of our circle. We can't hide from the world anymore, my brothers and sisters," Samuel said in a strange voice. "We must be ready for anything. We must be strong. And this is the first step. And now," he added, raising his glass of cider, "I'd like to propose a toast. To the future!"

"To the future!" the crowd echoed, and they all drank. Soon after the group fell into separate conversations, and Claire spotted Lydia promptly getting up from her chair and practically sprinting away from the table. She saw Samuel call after her, but she didn't stop, didn't even slow her pace.

Claire didn't know why, but she felt compelled to go after the inked woman. She found Lydia's tent, pausing before it because she wasn't quite sure what to say.

"I know you're there," a voice called from within. "Come in if you think you have to."

Claire entered the tent to find Lydia seated at her vanity, bathing her neck and face in a bowl of water. She turned to face the younger woman, her eyes like daggers.

"So, _Lady Phoenix_," Lydia began, a cool smile on her lips. "How does it feel to be a star?"

Claire bristled at the sniping comment. "Just what is your problem with me, Lydia?" she asked. "When I first met you, you led me to believe that I belonged here. Well, here I am," Claire held up her arms helplessly. "So what do you want from me?"

Lydia snorted. "Who said it had anything to do with you? This might come as quite a shock to you, Claire, but the world doesn't revolve around you. In spite of what Samuel might lead you to believe."

Claire rolled her eyes. "Oh, I see what it is now. My act has done well, and you're jealous. Well, you should know that it was Samuel's idea, and Samuel's coaching, and his schmoozing the audience that made that act so successful."

Lydia's face darkened under the snowy white washcloth. "Yes, Samuel knows best, doesn't he?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Can't tell you. Can't spoil the perfect little fantasy you've built up here."

Claire felt the blood fill her face. She was determined to be as hurtful as she possibly could. "So you're not Samuel's favorite anymore. So your act has grown old. That's not my fault."

Lydia turned to face Claire, a cruel smile playing upon her lips to contain her barely kept temper. "A word of advice, little girl," the tattooed lady hissed. "Before you give yourself away, make sure you know who you are first."

Claire immediately stormed out of the tent, the sound of Lydia's scornful laughter filling her ears. She knew what that spiteful bitch was trying to do: she was trying to intimidate Claire so that she'd leave the carnival. _Not going to happen_, Claire thought, kicking a stray stone in her path as she made her way to her tent.

It wasn't as clean, or as sweet smelling as her previous rooms had been in Odessa or Costa Verde or even the dorm in Alexandria. But it was hers and she'd had the freedom to do what she wished with it. On her first night, everyone from the carnival had brought her a little something from their own tents to help her feel at home. A yellow plastic alarm clock from Manuel, an orange glass lamp from Marcus. Olivia had sewn her sheets for her bed, blue and white ones that always made her feel warm when she was chilly, and cool when she was overheated. Samuel had brought her a painting that later became the inspiration for her act: a scarlet phoenix, its neck twisted painfully backwards, shrieking to the sky, as it stretched its wings outward and flew out of a mass of green and blue and white flames. Claire now turned towards the western wall of her tent and looked at this painting as she brought herself toward slumber, imaging she was flying over a sea of flames, feeling their warmth yet immune to their destruction.

*********

Claire was awake hours before she had to get out of bed. She lay there, listening to the birds twittering and feeling the thin cotton sheets sticking to her skin. The air was warm and seemed restless somehow, like the mornings leading up to the last day of school in the spring.

Finally the yellow plastic clock showed six on the dot, and Claire pulled herself out of bed. She dressed slowly, carefully, intrigued by the mix of contentment and anxiety she was feeling. Nearly half of the carnival was already awake by the time she emerged from her tent, already beginning the long and arduous process of packing everything up to move to their next location.

But, these were professionals and they had the process down to a science by then. Everyone worked together as one body, as one mind, each person knowing their part and performing it well. Claire watched the scene awkwardly, for the first time feeling out of place as she hadn't done this but once before. Much to her relief, she saw Eric Doyle coming towards her.

"Hey, Barbie," he said, his nickname for her now used with fondness instead of malice. "Samuel needs someone to pick up supplies before we leave. I volunteered; wanna come along?"

"Absolutely," Claire replied, happy to be out of the way and avoiding, among other uncomfortable things, Lydia's venomous stare.

********

The road to town was bumpy, and certainly it wasn't made any better by the beat up red pickup truck that Claire and the puppet man were riding in. Eric for one, hated the jostling, but when he looked over at his passenger he noticed that she didn't seem bothered by it. In fact, she seemed oblivious to it, apparently lost in her own world.

When they finally reached the closest convenience store, Eric quickly shut the motor off but didn't get out of the pickup. "What's wrong, Barbie?," he asked. "You've been even more vacant than usual."

Claire snorted lightly at his ribbing. "I was just thinking…what if I don't belong here, either?" She turned to look at her friend. "What do I do then?"

Much to Claire's surprise, Doyle looked frightened. "You're not thinking of leaving the carnival, are you?"

She grinned. "So what if I was? What's it to you, Puppet-Man?"

"Well then," Doyle began, "I'd be pretty mad at you. I'd probably make you cut off all that long blonde hair and give yourself a buzz cut. No use in only one of us being pissed off."

She laughed. "Well, then, I guess I'll stay. I happen to love my hair."

Doyle chuckled in reply and walked into the store. Claire followed, and found herself thinking something that surprised even her: _If only he was younger…and thinner_.

The list Samuel had made was fairly long, but not impossible. Claire and Doyle divided and conquered, and before long, the cart was full and they were on their way to the register.

Claire was enjoying listening to Doyle extol the virtues of a well-made corndog. It was one of the reasons he'd joined Samuel's carnival – because nowhere else had someone been able to combine the crunchy, buttery goodness of corn batter with the meaty richness of a hot dog with such perfect skill.

"Really, Barbie, you need to try them," Doyle told her, then eyed her body briefly. "Wouldn't kill ya. You're too skinny for my taste."

"I can't put on weight. My healing keeps my musculo-skeletal structure at the exact size I was when my powers activated," Claire blurted out, almost absent-mindedly.

Doyle raised an eyebrow. "Where'd that come from?"

"Oh, I was interested in biology when I was in high school. I used to actually enjoy my chemistry and anatomy classes. Plus I know a geneticist who did a lot of studies on regeneration." Claire wondered if Doyle could hear the distant sadness in her voice.

"You're better off with us, believe me," he told her reassuringly. "Trying to live in the outside world, even doing something you like – it'll only lead to disappointment. I know," he told Claire while putting the supplies on the conveyor belt.

Claire smiled, knowing that for Doyle, it was true and right for him to be here. For her, however, the nagging doubt remained. She wasn't sure that Samuel's surrogate family was where she belonged, but at the same time she couldn't bring herself to return to her old life. She felt weary thinking of the façade she had to put on while enduring the lecture halls and the mixers, of the suspicions she still felt when she saw her father.

The carnival was a new and exciting exit route out of her weariness, and she'd gleefully taken it. She'd intended to stay only two days when she first arrived at the carnival, but two days became five, then two weeks, then a month. She was surrounded by others who were like her, who had faced the same struggles, the same fears and prejudices. They held their arms out to her and opened their hearts. Claire tried to embrace them back, but she still felt distant from them – removed, as if she spoke another language and came from another culture.

She felt she had no reason to stay and no reason to go. She needed an impetus.

And then, as if God were listening to her thoughts, a familiar name was spoken on the TV at the register. And everything changed.

"The body of New York senator Nathan Petrelli was found among the ruins of a plane crash earlier today. It is believed Senator Petrelli was piloting the plane alone when an engine failure caused him to crash just ten miles outside of Albany. A private ceremony will be held for him tomorrow afternoon. He was 42."


	3. Chapter 3

Claire was silent, but her eyes filled with tears so fast she barely felt them prick at her lids. Without a word she left the groceries on the counter and began to walk out of the store, heedless of Doyle's shouts for her to stop.

Suddenly her body stopped itself in spite of her brain's urging it to continue. She felt herself being turned around, forcefully yet gently, to face Doyle.

She blinked, and the tears finally streamed down her cheeks. She could see the sympathy in Doyle's face.

"Who is he, Barbie?" he demanded. "Why does this guy mean so much to you?"

She let out a small cry and he released his control over her, only to find himself catching her as she fell forward.

"I'm okay, I'm okay," she said, as he helped her straighten. "He was my father, Doyle. Nathan Petrelli was my father."

Doyle was puzzled. "Your _father_? I thought Bennett – "

"Nathan was my biological father," she explained, then with a sharp glance at him she added, "Meredith…was my biological mother."

"Oh…Jesus Christ…," Doyle exclaimed, holding his head.

"Don't feel bad. No reason for both of us to," she muttered, the tears now beginning to sting. It was the first time she'd felt something close to pain in a long while, and she was actually grateful for it. "I have to go. I probably won't be coming back. It's all ruined now."

"Yeah. I'd go, but…well…I don't think I'd be welcome there."

"I wouldn't ask you to. You've found peace with the carnival. And I think – deep down – I knew I wasn't going to be here too long."

Doyle nodded, then smiled sadly when he thought of something. "But it was nice to be here for a while, wasn't it? At Peace, I mean."

"For a while," Claire confirmed, the tears now dry on her face.

*****************

A Greyhound bus brought her home, the whole six hours it took. If Claire were to measure that portion of her time, she could divide it in two parts. There was the Waiting part. In spite of her grief, she was anxious to get home, anxious to see her grandmother and Peter and her father. Anxious to find out what happened with Nathan's plane. She even imagined that she'd finally meet her half brothers, Simon and Monty. What would they think of her? Would they accept her or snub her as the illegitimate child she was?

Then there was Peter's call on her cell phone, and the Waiting part dissolved into the Dreading part. She didn't want to go home. Didn't want to see her father and his pathetic show of sympathy, his duplicitous justifications for what he and Angela and Matt Parkman had done. She didn't want to see Angela's cold face as she dished out some pearl of wisdom. She didn't want to stand on that green lawn while they honored Nathan, knowing that his death was no accident, that it could have been prevented.

She could have saved him.

She could feel her blood boiling beneath her skin as she thought of that day in Washington. Peter had risked his life bringing Sylar in, and what did they do? They gave him Nathan's memories and face! How did they think this was going to end? If only they had let her in on it. She could have brought Nathan back to life with her blood. Just one injection and he'd still be with them. Why didn't they kill Sylar? Why didn't they bash his brains in while he lie there, unconscious and harmless?

These thoughts, and many more like it whirled through her head and she sat there, no longer sitting back in her seat, gloomily looking out the window. No. Now she was on the edge of her seat, digging her nails into the seat in front of her, steaming and stewing to such a degree that at last there was a popping sound, and her nails had finally succeeded in penetrating the cheap green vinyl.

This roused Claire from her stupor, and self-consciously she looked around, checking to see if anyone had seen. But it was no one. Everyone was lost in their own world, their own hopes and dreams and joys and sorrows. The engine hummed and roared as the bus streaked forward to its destination.

She made it to the cemetery just as the priest was finishing his sermon. She'd had just enough time to check into a nearby hotel and buy a suit of respectable, dignified black. As she crossed the verdant expanse of the lawn, her eyes met Peter's and they nodded briefly to one another, feeling the hurt and the anger radiating off of one another. She nimbly avoided her father's approach when he saw her. Just a quick turn of her ankle and he'd either have to make a scene crossing over to her or just remain where he was. Naturally he chose the latter.

She found herself in just the right spot for the ceremonies: close enough that anyone looking from the outside in would imagine she was a close friend or family member, but far enough away that no one would guess that she was his daughter. That her heart was cracking under the strain of being lied to and betrayed and terrified at the nagging bastard of a thought that out there, somewhere, was the man who haunted her dreams and left her waking thoughts in unrest.

The wake, held at Angela's penthouse apartment, was crowded, full of people she didn't know and didn't want to get to know. She didn't want New York high society looking her up and down, sizing up her off-the-rack suit and unhighlighted, unlowlighted, unstyled hair and asking, "and how did you know Senator Petrelli, dear? Oh? Oh…well, I didn't realize the senator had had other children….well, it was…good of you to come, dear."

Claire looked at the photos of Nathan when he was five, playing with a football. Nathan when he was eleven, holding baby Peter on his lap. Nathan in high school. Nathan first in love. Nathan wearing tails and posing next to a stunning woman in white. Nathan and his sons.

Nathan the son, the brother, the husband, the father. So many people Nathan had been.

_Did you know Senator Petrelli well, Dear?_

_No, Dear. I didn't know him at all._

Then she felt a tender touch on her shoulder, and there was Peter. Silently he led her to the kitchen, where they dismissed the staff and took it upon themselves to finish the task of preparing the last of the food displays.

"Nothing like a little mindless labor when you're grieving," Peter quipped.

Claire smiled, and was surprised to find herself finding solace in green and yellow. The green and yellow of the limes and lemons were like a balm to her senses. The clean, crisp, sweetly floral smell of them on her fingers as she cut into their pulpy flesh with Peter and mourned. His eyes were so dark, as if his grief had dyed them. The grief, and the anger.

He took this opportunity to give her more details about his confrontation with Sylar, and his last moments with "Nathan," what his big brother had wanted Claire to know in his last moments of life.

"Those weren't Nathan's words, Peter," Claire snapped. "It was just what Matt Parkman had programmed Sylar to say. God! I can't believe I bought it! I can't believe I didn't see it-"

With one careless swipe of the knife, Claire found her fingers bleeding. Peter apologized and offered to turn off the Haitian's powers. Claire assured him that it was fine, that it felt good to feel the pain again. The pain, and the open feeling of cutting into flesh. There was something freeing about it, about severing those fragile bonds of skin and capillary, of allowing the lifeblood to flow out.

Peter's hand on hers brought her back to the moment. "He loved you, Claire. Doesn't matter how and when he died. Your love meant the world to him."

Claire smiled in gratitude and looked down at her clotting fingers. It almost felt like a tribute to Nathan, to show him how much his death meant to her. She hoped that in spite of her ability, there would be a scar.

"Life will continue. There will still be limes and lemons to cut," Angela told Claire as she brought the tray out to the sitting room. A couple of the women watched the young woman in her servile role and seemed to sigh in relief as if to say, _ah yes, so that's what she's doing here_.

Claire looked at her grandmother. Inexplicably her mind traveled to a short story she had read a few months ago for her American literature survey course. She couldn't remember the author or the name of the story, but it was the next to the last scene that had stuck with her. A young, idealistic girl goads her timid boyfriend into going to war, and after he dies, she goes to visit his elderly mother. The old woman double talks the girl, until she finally gathers her strength and cries, "What are you wearing that black for? Take it off, take it off, before I tear it from your back!"

That's how Claire felt now. Angela Petrelli, grieving mother, plotting opportunist. Everyone pitied her; she sat at the front of the ceremony and the soldiers gave her the folded flag. And if Claire were to ask, she was sure her biological grandmother would claim that she did what she did because she couldn't bear to let go of Nathan's memory. But she knew it was more than that. Angela had great plans, great dreams for Nathan. Power, fame, glory – something that she'd never gain with her younger son. There lay Sylar, the tragic lump of clay ready to be sculpted by her well-manicured hands. No thoughts of the consequences of her actions, only the great opportunities that one could only be seen through tunnel vision. And in that moment, the idea of tearing that elegant black St. John ensemble from Angela's limbs didn't seem so impossible to Claire.

"Indeed there will be, ma'am," Claire replied, an icy smile on her face. "All freshly cut, just as the Senator deserves." She set the tray down on one of the tables, turned to go.

"Claire, please," Angela stopped her, her voice low. "You have every right to be angry, but I have a favor to ask of you. Please look after Peter. He's so fragile right now, I'm afraid he'll do something foolish. He'll listen to you."

"Oh, Angela," Claire scoffed. "Surely a woman of your talents has better resources than little old me. In fact, I know you do. I've seen you use them."

Angela blinked, and then quickly guided Claire to a darker, quieter corner of the house. "I know I deserve that, but I am begging you to think of him. You've always been the strong one, of my children. Not even Nathan had your strength. I need you to use it now."

Claire looked away and the photos on the walls caught her attention. Different photos than before, this time of Angela's grandchildren. There were Simon and Monty, posed with their mother, and below them was Christina, the poor, sickly child that Peter had fathered with his childhood sweetheart, Simone. She had never known exactly how to feel about her brothers and cousin, but she knew it was something akin to envy – envy, that they had either lost the genetic lottery or never had a chance to play the game in the first place.

Claire now turned back to Angela, and her breath caught slightly in her throat when she realized that she had her grandmother's eyes. "I will look after Peter," she said softly. "But only for Peter's sake."

When Claire finally left the wake, she discovered her father waiting outside for her. He'd had the decency not to show his face at the wake – Angela's hypocrisy alone was quite enough – but now he was asking gently if she'd like a ride. Pleading with his eyes that she would.

****************

"What do you mean, she left!?" Samuel roared at Doyle when he returned to the camp by himself. "You did nothing to keep her here, you fool?"

Doyle flinched at Samuel's wrath. "Her father died. She-she had to go!"

Samuel's eyes widened. "Bennett? Well, that is some good news, isn't it?" He turned a sly eye towards Lydia, who was standing at the entrance to the tent with a scowl on her face.

Doyle shook his head. "Not Bennett. Petrelli. Nathan Petrelli."

Samuel said nothing in reply, and left the tent with a thoughtful glance at Lydia. Taking her cue, she followed after him.

Leaning against the water gun booth, Samuel chewed his thumb as the wheels in his head began to turn. Lydia crossed her arms and leaned against the side of the booth.

"What?" she finally asked.

"Don't you remember how Sylar was when he was with us? Like he was a different person? That – _that_ was the person he was, Lydia. He called himself 'Nathan.'"

"So…how is that possible?"

"I don't know…but I'm willing to bet anything that Bennett had something to do with it. And now I have a connection between Claire and the Petrellis. It's an opportunity I'm not going to let slip away." He stepped away from the booth and began to walk to his tent.

"What are you going to do?" Lydia called to him.

Samuel stopped, turned around, and smiled that smile that always left a knot of dread in Lydia's stomach. "Divide and conquer, my dear. Divide and conquer."

* * *

"I'm not going to ask you to forgive me."

"Good."

"But I am going to ask you to try to understand why I did what I did."

Claire turned away and opened the car window, allowing the chill air to hit her face. She felt trapped, suffocated somehow, and she needed fresh air. They were on 95 now, leaving New York behind them and headed south. At first Claire had asked Noah to drop her off at the hotel she had checked into that was just across the bridge in New Jersey, but he had persuaded her to allow him to take her back to Alexandria, back to Sandra's home.

Noah briefly turned away from the windshield to look over at his daughter, whose facial expression reminded him of a pot that was about to boil over. He was tempted to pull over on the interstate, to beg her to forgive him. It was his pride that kept him from doing so. He knew that Claire would forgive him – eventually. All he had to do was remain appropriately remorseful until she found herself in another dilemma, and because of who Claire was, she would surely find herself in one soon. But he had to keep his pride, had to remain self-assured so that when that moment came, that moment when she was about to lose hope, she would turn to him.

"Claire-bear, Matt and Angela and I did what we thought was right at the time. We see that it was a mistake now. I can't take that back."

"Did you even think about what you were doing before you did it? I thought that monster was my father! I felt love for him! I-I let him hold me!" Claire rubbed her arms as she said this, trying to rub Sylar's touch from her skin.

"We thought we were going to kill two birds with one stone. We'd keep Nathan alive, and get rid of Sylar for good." Noah avoided using the cliché 'we had the best of intentions.'

There was silence in the car for the better part of an hour. They were just approaching Baltimore when Claire decided to be the one to break the calm with a large sigh and the question, "So where do we go from here? Do we find Sylar and try to bring him down once and for all, or do we just wait until he kills someone else we care about?"

"I think for you there are more important things than Sylar," Noah replied. "Going back to school, for one thing. Putting your life back together, and putting the carnival behind you."

Claire turned to look at him. "Excuse me?"

"With Angela and Rene's help we'll get you back into school, perhaps even rooming with Gretchen again. I will help you fix the mess that's been made."

Claire scoffed. "No, thank you. I didn't come home because I wanted to go back to school. I came back because I found out that Nathan died. I came to attend his funeral."

"Claire," Noah began in a warning tone. "You don't need to protect those people. You got swept into Samuel's mind games. When you're ready, I'm hoping you'll give me that compass you took."

"How dare you?" Claire exploded. "How dare you try to make my choices for me? Isn't it bad enough you've lied to me for the past four months?"

"And how dare you just leave your friends and family behind without a word," Noah shot back as he swung the steering wheel sharply to the left when he realized that he was starting to ride into the right lane. "All that time you were with that – that cult, did you even think of your mother? Or Lyle? Or Gretchen? Did you even think of what the things you did would do to them?"

Claire lost her tongue at her father's jab. It wasn't just the guilt he'd conjured by his words. It was the doubt that always lingered with her, no matter where she went or who she was with. It was that small, shrill voice somewhere in her that told her that she didn't belong. She could have argued for the virtues of the carnival, she could have told her father that she finally felt needed and accepted there. But it would have been a lie, and Claire was so tired of lies. She didn't want to hear them, not even from herself.

They pulled up to Sandra's house around eleven, and when Claire looked up at the front door, there was her mother at the door, framed by the golden light of the porch. It almost felt like those days from high school, when Noah would be bringing Claire home from an away trip and Sandra would be there at the door, waiting to welcome them. The memory brought a moment of peace in her heart, but it came on the heels of a feeling of despair, of how things had changed so much in the last few years.

Noah was standing at her side with her bags. "Would you like me to come in with you?"

Claire smiled half-heartedly. "Thanks, but it's okay. I can take it from here." She began to walk the stairs into the brick townhouse.

"Claire," Noah called out, jumping up the stairs to catch up with her. "I want you to know…that I'm here for you. That will never change."

"I know," she said with a nod. "But you need to understand. I need time to grieve, without being reminded of why."

Noah stood at the bottom of the stairs, watching as Claire and Sandra embraced. Sandra then ushered Claire into the house, and then, giving a brief wave to Noah, shut the door behind her.

It shouldn't have bothered him by now, but it did. Noah was bothered as he drove away from Sandra's house. It wasn't as if he'd never experienced anger, or betrayal, or grief. His problem wasn't dealing with his situation; it was finding the solution.

He was the man with the plan, but the plan was usually one that he created, that he formulated like an equation, considering all variables and balancing all of them. What he hadn't anticipated was that the plan he needed, the solution he was looking for, would be created apart from him, and that he would become one of the variables in the equation.

This saving equation, this stroke of good luck came to Noah just as he was entering his tiny apartment in Washington. The phone rang. He recognized the number. He answered. He listened to the plea on the other end.

"Yes, I'm home. Come over," he said. "Yes, of course I'll help. But I need you to do something for me."


End file.
